News & Opinion

CFAC files suit in affirmative action case to defend researcher’s academic freedom and oppose State Bar’s claim that it is above the law of access By Peter Scheer Richard Sander, a highly regarded UCLA law professor and statistician, is conducting research with important implications for higher education. To complete the research, which has been the subject of many scholarly articles and intense academic interest, he needs access to a California government database. So why has

CFAC, scholars sue CA State Bar for access to records on affirmative action A debate about the effects of affirmative action in higher education has moved from the classroom to the courtroom following the filing today of a lawsuit against the State Bar of California to force it to disclose years of statistical records on bar exam results. The records are sought for an academic research project that will test the controversial theory that affirmative

Security plans for the Democratic convention in Denver must be changed to make room for dissent By Benjamin Grant Ladner The upcoming Democratic National Convention inspires optimism among many advocates for free-speech and open government; an Obama presidency, should it come to pass, is seen as a welcome opportunity to redraw the balance between government secrecy and accountability. That optimism, however, must be tempered by what stands to go on outside of the convention, in

Foreign media at Olympics urged to press home governments to demand China lift internet censorship (CFAC, 8/1/08) A free speech organization leading a legal challenge to China’s internet-censorship has called on news media covering the Olympics to demand that China tear down “The Great Firewall”–the elaborate system of filters blocking access to online content deemed objectionable by government censors. The California First Amendment Coalition, which has petitioned the US Trade Representative to contest China’s censorship

Judge Kozinski, controversial conservative and free speech supporter, to speak at Oct. 18 Assembly Acclaimed–and controversial–jurist Alex Kozinski, Chief Judge of the US Court of Appeals (for the Ninth Circuit), will be the featured speaker at CFAC’s 2008 Free Speech and Open Government Assembly at UC Berkeley. He will speak on Saturday, Oct 18. Judge Kozinski, appointed to the Court of Appeals by President Reagan (when Kozinski was all of 35!), is a favorite of